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Friday, December 07, 2012

Gift

Over the past week the rain has been fairly constant and the cooler weather persists. Not being able to get out for longer walks, this weather pattern allows us to get on with a few jobs and tasks that you just don't want to do when the sun shines. I have been sorting out the stores whilst Luis has been away at the first Matanza of the season in his family home in Palencia.

Knowing only too well that he will come back with an estate car full of goods from his Sister Rita, it was important to take stock of what needed using up and also to create space for the additional produce. Sorting through our stores it once again came to mind how generous people i.e. family, friends and neighbours are.

Over the past few weeks we have been gifted:

A Christmas cake
A crate of home-produced cider
A couple of kilos of locally grown Avocados
Approx 20 Kilos of apples
A jar of rich brown sugar from France
several jars of jams and pickles
Sweet Chestnut Paste and eggs
A brand new leather jacket

We could have also had as much pork, ham, salami, chorizo or pork products as we had wanted but Luis has stopped eating meat for the time being so there seemed no point in stocking up on food that we would not use. The four packs of chorizo he brought home are for friends and visitors. He decided not to participate in the actual slaughter of the two pigs this time as it is never pleasant and not eating meat he did no longer feel obliged to participate. There is always enough work to do following the deed so he was inevitably kept very busy with the processing of the animals.

Together with our own harvests of fruits, vegetables and nuts, our bulk buy products and the produce we process into jams and pickles, we have a well stocked larder and really do not need to do much shopping for the foreseeable future.

We frequently gift produce ourselves and enjoy giving family, friends and neighbours samples of our soap, hand-creams, jams, pickles etc... Our thoughts on giving can be found here on one of our other blogs. A big thank you to all.